mercies towards us, in our prevailing againſt his & our enimies"—says:
"The priſoners were devided, ſome to thoſe of ye river [the Connecticut Colony] and the reſt to us. Of theſe we ſend the male children to Bermuda, by Mr. William Peirce, & ye women & maid children are diſpoſed aboute in ye tounes. Ther have now been ſlaine and taken, in all, aboute 700." M. H. S. Coll., iv., iii, 360. Compare the order for "diſpoſing of ye Indian ſquaws," in Mass. Records, i., 201.
Bradford's note to the letter quoted above, ſays of their being ſent to Bermuda: "But ye were carried to ye Weſt Indeas."
Hubbard, the contemporary hiſtorian of the Indian Wars, ſays of theſe captives, "Of thoſe who were not ſo deſperate or ſullen to ſell their lives for nothing, but yielded in time, the male Children were ſent to the Bermudas, of the females ſome were diſtributed to the Englith Towns; ſome were diſpofed of among the other Indians, to whom they were deadly enemies, as well as to ourſelves." Narrative, 1677, p. 130.
A ſubſequent entry in Winthrop's Journal gives us another glimpſe of the ſubject, Feb. 26, 1638.
"Mr. Peirce, in the Salem ſhip, the Deſire, returned from the Weſt Indies after ſeven months. He had been at Providence, and brought ſome cotton, and tobacco, and negroes, etc., from thence, and ſalt from Tertugos;" Winthrop, i. 254. He adds to this account that "Dry fiſh and ſtrong liquors are the only commodities for thoſe parts. He met there two men-of-war, ſet forth by the lords, etc., of Providence with letters of mart, who had taken divers
